


Best Kept Secret (Biggest Mistake)

by orangesofsymmetry



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst, M/M, also don't worry phan is the basis of this story, basically a bucket load of angst, not the ocs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-28
Updated: 2014-10-28
Packaged: 2018-02-23 01:22:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2528810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orangesofsymmetry/pseuds/orangesofsymmetry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one knows why Phil Lester sticks around.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Best Kept Secret (Biggest Mistake)

If anybody were to ask them, they probably couldn’t answer, because there is the matter that simply no one knows.

No one knows why Phil Lester still sticks around, especially not Dan Howell.

It’s a riddle and Dan can’t explain why Phil is always so happy and so sad at the same time. He can’t quite place why Phil is still stuck in the same dead end job that he was in five years ago, or why Phil doesn’t just fuck off and claim his life back, not that he wants him to. He just – it would probably make Phil a lot happier if he weren’t living with him anymore.

It’s more of an issue that Dan’s happily settled, pretty much, with Matt now, and Phil still seems to be drifting. He’s given up promotions at work just to stay drifting along with them, godsake, given up more stable jobs with solid pension plans and bigger paychecks and Dan doesn’t have a reason why. He asked, once, and Phil told him that he was perfectly content where he was. Dan’s not sure if he’s lying or not.

There just doesn’t seem to be any reason for Phil’s unfaltering loyalty to him, not that there has to be, really, but Dan supposes sometimes that it would be nice to know.

It’s how it lands them here, Dan staring at him while he sleeps, while they’re travelling from London down to buttfuck nowhere on some sort of bonding trip pitched by Elliot, trying to find the answer to all of his questions in the bags under Phil’s eyes.

The table is cramped, rattling a bit (a lot) around the window like trains tend to. Dan’s seat is fucked, as is his spine, but Elliot worked his arse off organising this trip (even if it is kind of shit so far) and you don’t tell your one of your best friend how shitty a job they’ve done when they’ve worked so hard, even if it kind of is.

The train lurches slightly, Phil shifting, eyelashes fluttering. The artificial light is scattered by the raindrops on the window, Phil’s face obscured slightly by their reflections on his cheeks. Still, he looks oddly at peace. He’s cute, is Phil, but clearly a friend. Nothing more. Obviously. Next to Dan, Matt shifts, resting his head on his chest, straining to get closer. Dan chuckles slightly, planting a kiss onto Matt’s temple. Matt is good people; Matt is more than a friend, Matt is a safety net; needed, a reassurance. Essential. He’s also vulnerable and insane, a contradiction as ever, a flag in a hurricane. His. Dan leans into him, burrowing his head into the nape of his neck.

Across from him, Phil cracks open an eyelid and smiles bitterly.

Dan’s hair is stuck up in tufts, red, brown and golden in the light. His skin is ethereally beautiful, smile soft and tempting. He is divine.

Matt snuffles in his chest.

Phil knows, knows, that it should not pain him so much, but watching Dan with someone else, watching Dan with Matt, slowly tears him apart. It shouldn’t; he likes Matt, hell, he loves Matt as if he were his own brother, for fuck’s sake, but it’s Dan. Dan who he has had a crush ranging from schoolgirl to, oh shit, in love for years.

He’s fully awake now, shivering slightly in the moderately cold air of the carriage.

Elliot glances up from his phone next to him, frowning lightly. “Alright there, mate?” He asks, and Phil can see a ray of light shine from his wedding band. Phil nods, grabbing the blanket that’s half covering his legs. “I don’t know why you put up with that.” Elliot says, nodding at Matt and Dan across from them, snuggled together in the most disgustingly adorable way possible. Almost as an afterthought he adds, “or us, for that.”

And Phil looks at the back of Dan’s head and thinks, iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou, but says nothing but, “I don’t know, either.”

No one knows why Phil Lester still sticks around and Phil plans to keep it that way.

It’s just not worth it.

**Author's Note:**

> i have been writing a load recently like idk what that's all about but i hope it continues! anywhere yeah wasn't that a barrel of laughs?  
> as always, thanks for reading and if you wanna hmu at carnagemayhem.tumblr.com please do!!


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